Café de Coral: Music to Adjust a Restaurant’s Pace

Serving 300,000 customers daily, Café de Coral is one of the largest and most popular fast food chains in Hong Kong. It was founded in 1968 with the idea of offering affordable meals for working-class wage earners. And indeed, the restaurant’s typical Chinese and international dishes have proved well liked by the city’s working class, and even its general population. Café de Coral is by no means gourmet, but for a handful of dollars you get a full meal that looks and tastes good. No wonder there are lines at most its branches at mealtimes.

Café de Coral at Hong Kong Plaza, a 41-floor high office building in Sai Wan, is always busy. Being inside an office building, it is a popular choice of its office workers. At times between mealtimes, when the queue is shorter and the eatery more sparsely occupied, soothing instrumental music is heard at the background, infusing the atmosphere with a laidback, relaxed ambience. However, is it the suitable type of music to play during peak hours such as lunch break? Most fast food restaurants across the world combine fast paced music with a strong colour palette to make the customers want to leave as soon as possible. Do you think Café de Coral should play different types of background music depending on how much the restaurant wants to facilitate table turnover?